Indian found unconscious for 15 hours in UAE airport

Dubai, July 18 (IANS) An expatriate Indian remained unconscious in an airport in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for 15 hours before he was found in that condition, a media report said.

Sambandan Siva, 51, who works in a UAE-based firm and had taken a month's leave as he was not keeping well, was supposed to board an Air Arabia flight July 2 evening from Sharjah International Airport and reach Chennai in India at 2.30 a.m. July 3.

He had completed his check-in and also cleared immigration but lost consciousness thereafter, the Xpress of Dubai reported.

However, he was discovered in that state only July 3 morning after his worried family contacted his employers, the Al Huraiz Group, when he failed to arrive by the scheduled flight.

Company officials then contacted the airline and airport authorities.

"An airport official took his details from us and went in the airport to search for him," an Al Huraiz Group official was quoted as saying.

"At around 11.30 a.m., we were informed that he had been found and was in bad shape. They cancelled his immigration check and handed him over to us. We immediately rushed him to Rashid Hospital," the official said.

Siva is now lying in a coma at the hospital in Dubai and his condition is said to be critical.

"I really don't know whom I should blame, the airport authority who didn't notice (him) for 15 hours or the airline which didn't bother to check for the passenger after issuing the boarding card," a company official was cited as writing in a complaint to the Sharjah airport authorities.

The airport authorities have assured the company that the matter would be looked into and action taken but did not respond when the Xpress tried to contact them.

The company official said that had Siva been noticed earlier, he would have received timely medical treatment and would not have been in the condition he is now.